NSNC 2026 Columnist Contest - Now Open

Sunshine Week March 15-21, 2026

Consider a Gift to the NSNC Education Foundation

Join NSNC and Reap the Benefits!

NSNC 2026 Columnist Contest - Now Open

Contest submissions now open! We are accepting entries from columnists, bloggers, and serial essayists  for our 2026 Annual Columnist Contest (for work published in 2025). We will accept entries from columnists, bloggers, and serial essayists published in 2025.  Everyone is welcome to submit. You don’t have to be an NSNC member.

Sunshine Week March 15-21, 2026

We’re counting down to #SunshineWeek 2026, March 15-21. Together, we champion #OpenRecords and #OpenGovernment nationwide March 15-21. #FOIA #transparency. Free resources: sunshineweek.org

Consider a Gift to the NSNC Education Foundation

The National Society of Newspaper Columnists Education Foundation is a tax-exempt charitable organization [501(c)3] devoted to the education and training of new and experienced columnists everywhere. Donate here: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/NSNCEdFnd

Join NSNC and Reap the Benefits!

We are excited for What’s in-store for NSNC members this year. We are gearing up to launch the NSNC Annual Columnist Contest on January 15, so you’ll want to be sure your membership is up-to-date. Also, if you have ideas, suggestions, etc., please share them with our President Meredith Cummings at meredithcummings@gmail.com or Executive Director Ginny McCabe at nsncdirector@gmail.com. Thank you for your support of NSNC!

Snapshots of a Layoff

Fort Worth Live Stock Exchange

I’m not expecting this. Well, I am, eventually, just not at this moment. you, the columnist By Dave Lieber Unaffiliated It’s 1993. My first column. By way of introduction, I ask readers of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram if chicken-fried steak is chicken or steak. I know. It’s a dumb way to begin. Maybe the dumbest.…

NSNC Board Member Brinkley under Fire

Tribune Media Services

By Ben S. Pollock Director of Online Media, 2010-12 president National Society of Newspaper Columnists Joel Brinkley, 2012-14 education chair of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists, has come under fire for his column dated Feb. 1, 2013, that compared the diets of several Southeast Asian countries. Brinkley, a Pulitzer Prize winner for international reporting,…

In the February Newsletter

newspaper

The annual NSNC Conference is coming in June — June 27-30 to be precise — at the Hilton Hartford Hotel in Hartford, Conn. See the newsletter for a preview of this exciting event. Also, regular contributor Dave Lieber writes about his layoff from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. Read what your colleagues are writing … also…

Robert C. Koehler: Peace, Healing and Op-ed

Stoopendaal Map of the World - 1730

Art of Column Writing By Suzette Martinez Standring 2004-06 President National Society of Newspaper Columnists Spirituality and conscience underscore the opinion columns by Robert C. Koehler who ranks among the top op-ed columnists nationally, according to Media Matters. Syndicated since 1999 with Tribune Media, Bob is a self-described peace journalist whose columns expose the facts,…

Nominations Open for 2013 Will Rogers Award

Will Rogers typing

Robert Haught, longtime coordinator of the NSNC’s Will Rogers Humanitarian Award, has announced nominations now are being accepted for this year. The deadline for entries is Monday, April 1, 2013, with the honoree notified by May 1, 2013. The recipient will be honored at the NSNC annual conference, this year to be June 27-30, in…

‘Startlegram’ Drops ‘Watchdog’ Columnist

Turkey vulture, Cathartes aura, 2007. Photo Joshin Yamada, Wikipedia

The circling turkey vultures of corporate newspaper ownership landed in Fort Worth this week. Among the downsized Tuesday, Jan. 8, 2013, at the Star-Telegram was its consumer “watchdog” columnist, Dave Lieber. Lieber is the 2002 recipient of the Will Rogers Humanitarian Award of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists and is secretary of the NSNC…